Global Agenda: Free Agent

Updates to Global Agenda have been released. The updates will be applied automatically when your Steam client is restarted. The major changes include:

Server downtime: The Global Agenda Servers are expected to be down on FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2011 from ~11:30 AM to 3:00 PM US Eastern (16:30 to 20:00 GMT) while the patch is deployed. Watch GAServerStatus on Twitter for the latest server availability information.

Changes since Version 1.5- Vendors and the Agent Profile now list item/weapon types- Vendors show the items required player level only when you are below it.- Item tooltips now show the required player level at all times.

Bugs Fixed in Version 1.5.1.0- Fixed numerous terrain and geometry issues in North Sonora.- The NPCs spawned for the Enemy at the Gates assignment no longer reward loot or XP.- Some assignments were incorrectly configured to be considered complete when you accepted them; those are now fixed.- Fixed a bug in the HUD Assignment indicators that occasionally made them invisible.- Fixed a number of incorrect item icons.- The vendor screen has an option to purchase Agenda Points, to reduce confusion on how to acquire them.- The tutorial should no longer show the movement help during the opening cinematic.- Exiting the tutorial will now always direct your character to Dome City.- Improved feedback for vendor items that require achievements before purchasing

Updates to Global Agenda have been released. The updates will be applied automatically when your Steam client is restarted. The major changes include:

Version 1.5 is the first release of the Recursive Colony expansion and includes major new features, new content and fixes for Global Agenda, including the North Sonora Open Zone.

Server downtime: The Global Agenda Servers are expected to be down on WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 21, 2011 from ~11:00 AM to 5:00 PM US Eastern (16:00 to 22:00 GMT) while the patch is deployed. Watch GAServerStatus on Twitter for the latest server availability information.

Major Highlights since Version 1.4

General- A new Open Zone: North Sonora - continues where Dr. Bolonov left off in observing the Recursive Colony at New Yuma. The Colony has grown increasingly aggressive and is now encroaching heavily on ARM territory. This zone leads players out into the northern part of the Sonoran region to discover the Colonys origins and attempt to suppress its threat to the freed people of Dome City.- Quests are now referred to as assignments in game to avoid confusion with missions.

Maps- Significant additions and reworks to Intro missions, including class-based tutorials- Push - Dust: Reworked first objective point- Push - Dust is now available in the Mercenary PvP queue- Acquisition - Colony Cavern: A new Acquisition map in a Recursive setting. Now available for testing in the Beta Maps queue- North Sonora has numerous new instances available for play as you progress through the assignment line.

Features- The assignment system has been improved considerably to allow a greater variety of game play in North Sonora.- New Repeatable Daily assignments are available in the new zone.- Assignment rewards may now include random items that help your character progression.- Improved interfaces on the assignment dialog and log.- Elite Agents now earn a 50% bonus to XP and credits received from assignments.- Boosters now earn a 50% bonus to XP and credits received from assignments.- Boosters may occasionally receive an additional random reward from assignments.- Beacons have been networked together in the open zones, allowing teleportation to specific, previously explored areas of the open zone.- You can now change what assignment you are tracking from the HUD. The default keybind is G, and allows you to quickly scan the area for your assignments.- You may now switch to a different instance of an open zone without having to return to Dome City. See the transport kiosks just outside the Dome for more details. Note: VR Arena instance kiosks were fixed in the process.- Added a zone chat, which connects all instances of an open zone together.You can switch to the zone channel by starting your chat message with /1 . /z  also works, as does using the existing UI.- City chat continues to support /c, though it is now considered a zone channel and also respects the /1 chat directive.- Dont be surprised if you find random chests with loot when traversing North Sonora.- Elite Agent and Boosters are now available in-game for Agenda Points.- Disconnect now returns you to Character Select screen instead of the login screen.- Leveling up now grants a full health and power pool restore.- Clients should no longer freeze for a few seconds between login attempts.- Added various help and tutorial systems. More will be added.- Removed the old detailed help menu, which was out-of-date.- Rare Goods Vendor was banned for using AvA exploits.- On-screen notifications when raid and other timed events become available.

Bots- Juggernauts should now award XP when killed.- Ticks now award XP when killed.- Increased XP awarded from Colony Snipers that appear in Raid missions.- Colony Wasps should now better pursue their targets out of LOS- Many previously unseen enemies have been sighted in North Sonora.

Bugs Fixed in Version 1.5- Weapons with right-click secondary fire modes now correctly use the initially fired attack to determine damage and effects (commonly known as the Beat Stick bug)- Fixed Helot Minigun not having improved accuracy when using right-click turret mode.- Robotics HEL-TAC Rifle now has less visual sight-blocking effects whiled firing scoped- Fixed missing invulnerability in attacker tech pod in Hex Plant 03 and Hex Missile Facility.- In the open zones, you should no longer be respawned in an unexplored location.- Network and system improvements should eliminate most of the previous lag-related assignment issues.- Improved the received item UI: you now should be able to see the full item name.- The promotion systems feedback has been bugfixed and improved.- When equipping, changing offhand or dye slots should no longer set your equipment back to the first page.- Fixed a client crash caused by whispering target names of a certain length.- Boosted Agents should now be able to fly in Dome City irrespective of their client machines settings.- Your chat should default to the zone chat channel when appropriate, rather than starting you in the local channel.- Assignment-specific missions should have a simplified end-of-mission screen rather than the standard screen populated with no data.- Right-click inspecting Agents no longer shows you their currency.

Updates to Global Agenda have been released. The updates will be applied automatically when your Steam client is restarted. The major changes include:

New Merc PvP Maps

Volcano Assault: Breach-style map

Himalayan Point: Breach-style map. Scenes from this map can be seen in the original Global Agenda talking heads trailer. (NOTE: This map will not be in queue immediately upon deployment due to a known issue in the map. We will be releasing a fix shortly to add it in)

Toxicity: Payload-style map

Additional Merc PvP changes

New Merc-specific PvP Rewards: New epic combat jetpacks for each class are now available as rare mission rewards from Merc PvP. They have a different look, slightly less power usage, increased thrust and flight speed, and will bind on equip.

Players can now specify Attacker or Defender when issuing a Challenge (in support of future Attack/Defend style Challenge maps).

New Challenge Map

Missile Complex is a new map within the Challenge queue. It is a two-point Breach style map designed for 4v4.

Dome City News & Hall of Legends

Dome City News: A new area in the Central Hub will display up-to-date information on world events, seasonal events and contests.

Hall of Legends: A new area within Dome City displays the winner of previous AvA seasons.

AvA Season End Rewards

AvA season end rewards are now divided into three brackets: Winner (1st place), Runners-Up (2nd and 3rd place), and Honorable Mention (the remainder of the top ten finishers)

Removed AvA offhand devices from all loot tables.

Epic quality mods and repair kits will now be awarded to placing agencies for use or sale

Added additional vehicles, dropships, and deployables to season end rewards.

AvA Interested Flag

On Settings screen, there is a new AvA Interested flag that defaults to Yes.

On Team screen, there is a new search filter for AvA Interested.

Intent is that short-staffed teams can fill in with others looking for AvA matches.

Seasonal Flair in preparation for the Twelve Drops of Christmas

New flair items introduced that can be earned by completing Holiday Challenges. The specific player challenges and items will be announced as part of December Twelve Drops of Christmas event. Device Changes:

Added a small amount of damage to each tick, which will enable proper Assist credit to be awarded to the paingun user and count toward building boost.

Converted AvA reward offhands to OC versions of the base class devices with perfect stat bonuses (ddd, hhh). This will no longer allow multiple items of the same type (e.g. multiple heal grenades or force walls) to be equipped. The new versions have slightly better base stats than the standard non-OC versions, and can also now be purchased at epic quality from the class device vendors for tokens. The new OC versions will now bind on acquire.

Open Zone Changes:

New Yuma:

Increased respawn time of most Recursive Colony bots in New Yuma somewhat.

Increased respawn time of Legion Sergeant squads slightly.

Increased respawn time of Guillermos guards.

Increased respawn time and decreased bot count of Kanar Warriors in the raid encampment slighty.

Increased respawn time of the sniper in the encampment significantly.

Decreased vision range of Colony Drone Mk. 2

Presidio:

Reduced the count and increased the respawn time of Kanar Warriors

Reduced initial count of Kanar Laborers

Increased respawn time of Capt. Marek Vidals guards

Capt. Marek Vidal ran out of his Commonwealth-issued roids after 10 long years and subsequently had his health and damage reduced

Removed sell price from quest items to help discourage accidentally selling them and breaking the quest chain. These items can now only be trashed: Power Casing, Nitrogen Coolant Core, Data Cable, PB of Ram

Reduced the number of Legion Gunners required for Let the Legion Lie to 2

Increased mission timer for Between Life and Death from 15 to 20 mins

Fixed bug where salvaged components were not usable in crafting, mail or auction.

Fixed bug where Blueprints or Dyes were not dropping as End Mission Rewards. Any earned rewards have been restored to players.

Fixed bug with page numbering on Weapon and Armor upgrades screen.

Colony Crawlers have evolved to be more aware and will now reliably attack opponents when damaged.

PvP achievement that are only for Level 30+ now specify that within description text

Sorting by cost on vendors now works as intended.

Fixed some haircut combinations that resulted in mis-coloring or baldness (the Barber responsible has been sacked).

Fixed bug that caused female assaults to use male animations when the Legion SMG was equipped.

Fixed issue where multiple mods applications could be attempted on an item without the player being aware. Now, while a mod is pending for an item, additional mods cannot be added. The repair wrench on agent profile, and the combine button at the Item Modification Shop, will not be shown until the first modification is complete.

Fixed bug where mods could be added to consumables.

Fixed bug where players sometime appear to glow brightly.

The elves were up to their shenanigans in Breach: Beachhead. Fixed the magically floating trees.

All characters on your account now share most inventory item types in the same way they share credits and tokens

For example, an Achievement Reward Helm earned by one character is now wearable by any other character in your account. Similarly all your crafting materials are shared by all characters in your account.

Exceptions include: Suits and Weapons. Both of these item types are class-specific and are still character-based.

With this change, all Mail and Auction activity is also Account-Based and no longer Character-Based.

As part of the data conversion to Account-Based inventory, any items in your mail-box will be removed from mail and automatically placed within your Inventory.

Achievements & Rewards

Users who recruit other players into the game will now receive achievements & badges. Plus achievement item rewards for big recruiters. More Friends = More Benefits!

Recruit 1 friend - Happy Bag flair item

Recruit 2 friends - Mad Bag flair item

Recruit 3 friends - Knockout Bag flair item

Recruit 4 friends - Scared Bag flair item

Recruit 5 friends - Boonie Cap flair item

Recruit 20 friends! - Frank the Tank prestige pet

Recruit 50 friends!! - Baby Warlord prestige pet

AvA Achievements - An achievement has been added for AvA participation

Challenge function

Pre-made teams can now challenge each other to matches.

A 4 person team leader can issue a /challenge in-game to another leader of 4-person team. If the challenged team-lead accepts, the teams play a 4v4 mission against one another from a named 'challenge' queue.

Match results are recorded in the database with with the addition of a "Challenge" flag and this data is available to third party reporting sites via the stats API. /Challenge can be used for informal duals but also to support any player-managed tournaments, brackets, and team rankings.

Challenge Map List - current map list contains a small number of 4v4 maps only. More maps will be added in the future.

Challenge Achievements - Achievements have been added for using /ChallengeThreat Changes

Made threat levels decay over time

Made threat impact of healing be spread out over all the impacted threat tables rather than being applied entirely to them all

Fixed a bug with threat targeting that was causing results inconsistent with threat values when bots attempted to target the opponent with the most hate.

Device Changes:

Super Smash Boost and Oathbreaker Morale Boost had their buff values decreased significantly, to be more in line with other Boost devices

Assault Rockets - all rocket launchers had their AoE radius brought in slightly

MagmaLance - Initial impact damage reduced 10%

Recon Mines - all mines had their total damage decreased 10%

Nanite Heal Guns - initial heal application value was doubled

Power Wave - Power Regen removed. Now instantly grants 60 power to affected allies, and an additional 20 over 4 seconds

Neutralize Wave - Removed poison dot effect. Instead deals damage for each beneficial effect removed. Now correctly removes Regeneration. Fixed an issue that made it so Neutralize Wave incorrectly skipped removing movement and damage penalties applied by Regeneration and shields, while still removing the associated buffs.

Assaults Berserk offhand had its effect category changed to now correctly stack with offhand shields

Grizzly and Harrier Drones had their accuracy reduced slightly

Poison Grenade, Heal Grenade, and Soul Stealer should now correctly use LOS and not deal damage/heals through force walls and geometry

Fixed an effect issue with Dual Daggers on female characters

The visual effects for the Assault Minigun and Robotics Rumbleblaster have been updated for better visibility

AvA

AvA - Minimize Bid Locking - The bid window time is now random. The match always launches 4 minutes from the initial bid, but the time between initial bid and final bid is random. In conjunction with this change, the Agency rebid timer was changed from 30 seconds to 10 seconds. This is intended to allow agencies to be more responsive to being outbid.

AvA Helm for 10 wins - A new epic holo-helm has been added as a reward for the Win 10 Seasons of AvA achievement.

AvA Platforms had their Physical Protections reduced by 5

Halloween

There will be an in-game Halloween event running from Wed. 10/27 through Sunday 10/31.

A new Halloween-styled Defense Map will be the only map in the Defense Queue for that period - Oasis Checkpoint... of Doom.

13 new Halloween masks of Uncommon through Epic qualities, have been introduced for the event.

These mask flair items are acquired by playing the Halloween Defense map. They have a chance to drop from any bot in the mission, but will always drop from defeating the end boss.

Halloween flair items are seasonal and can only be worn from October 1 through November 30th.

Other changes

Drop rates for T2 Armored Plate and X8 Nanoprocessors were increased and can also now drop from Colony Drone Mk. 2 in Raids

Due to budget cuts within the CPSD, Think Tanks will no longer appear in Double Agent missions.

Carter's Accessories received a new shipment of Minotaur heads and other backlogged items that were unavailable for a while, and are once again available in exchange for tokens.

The Tremor Pilot Flair sold at Carters Accessories had its quality increased from Common to Uncommon

New Prestige Pets Added. Mini-versions of the Commonwealth Elite enemies (Helot, Alchemist, Techro, Assassin) have been introduced as prestige pets. Mold Blueprints for these pets are rare end of mission loot drops from winning Ultra-Max and DoubleAgent SpecialOps missions. Molds are then crafted and used in conjunction with the Pet blueprint available from new PetCraft shop in Accessory area.

New Holo Suits as AvA Season Victory Rewards - A Rewards shop has been added to the Strike Force area of Dome City. The shop is stocked with 3 new Holo-Suits for each class. These suits are purchased with tokens but they are only available to players who have earned AvA Victory achievements.

The Warzones line has been removed from Mission Screen. Global Agenda will not be introducing a new Warzone gametype. Future updates will enhance and add content for existing gametypes including OpenZone, PvE SpecOps, PvP, Raids, and AvA.

Miscellaneous Bug fixes:

Modified description text for Top Stat achievements - now makes it clear that character must be level 30+ to earn these achievement.

Fixed Quality Level of All Achievement Helms: Item Tooltip Quality Color was not matching the Icon or the Quality of the device

X-Box Controller Fix

Account-based inventory - Miscellaneous clean up around flair specific to each character and fixes issue where crafting skill are shared but crafting materials are not.

Fixed issue where some crewable vehicles do not fire

Vindicator Siege I

Vindicator Siege II

Dark Steel Vindicator

Fixed issue with health max change not setting correctly

Recursive Colony Hunter Spiders have evolved and will now only attempt to use their objective damaging beam when in range

Fixed issue where master volume slider adjustment was not causing sound effect, music and incoming voice sliders to move

Fixed collision in remote area of OpenZone where players would be stuck falling forever.

Known IssuesHere are some particular known issues to be aware of:

Leaving an agency sometimes does not work properly

The Icons for Knockout Bag, Scared Bag, and Boonie Cap are being reworked.

Holosuits Achievement Required message extends past viewable area.

Certain Specialty Head Flair Items Appear Equipped on Profile Screen, but not on player in-game.

An update to Global Agenda has been released. The updates will be applied automatically when your Steam client is restarted. The major changes include:

Players with an active BOOSTER will be rewarded 2,000 tokens a day automatically at approximately Midnight GMT. Note that tokens will **NOT** be awarded if a player is at their WEEKLY or BANK limit on tokens (currently players are limited to earning no more than 50,000 tokens in a week and have a maximum bank size of 50,000 tokens). Players will not see the tokens until the first time after they relog following the token distribution time.

Pre-made teams joining Mercenary PvP queue must now contain either all Level 30+ players, or all players less than Level 30.

Players must now be in an agency for 7 days prior to the AvA end of season in order to receive the end-of-season reward.

Several client crash conditions have been fixed.

Possible fix for players launching onto another region's server even when the "Match on other Regions" flag is unchecked.

A bug in which items could be improperly unbound from your character has been fixed.

German profanity filter added.

Some bot spawns in the Moving Target map have been fixed. Commonwealth spiders will no longer take out their frustrations on the Dune Commander.

Modifications have been made to the AvA End of Season device rewards.

Hex 219 added to Region 2 of NA Sovereign zone.

Deleted some players "Single class top stats" achievements that were incorrectly awarded

Updates to Global Agenda have been released. The updates will be applied automatically when your Steam client is restarted. The major changes include:

Major Highlights

German Language Support: This release contains German Language support. To change to German, use the OPTIONS menu on the Global Agenda Launcher. If you find errors or oddities in the German translation, please report on the Version 1.38 Test Server forums.

Achievements: A full achievement system has been added. Players can view achievements using the ACHIEVEMENTS tab on the Agent Profile screen. Some achievements will award helmets or other flair as they are achieved.

Quick Swap Profiles: Players can now purchase multiple equipment profiles for each character from a vendor in Dome City, using Tokens. Each profile can have unique Skill Tree, weapon, and armor choices. You can change profiles anywhere that you can equip. Each new profile that you purchase costs twice the number of tokens as the previous profile. [MORE TO FILL IN]

Special Vanity Items: This release introduces two new special/rare items -- Magic Elf Goggles, which you wear during PvP matches and cause all enemies to appear to have elf heads (so you can have fun shooting them); and a Vanity Pet (Sparky), which follows you in Dome City while also giving your character a 50% groundspeed boost while in Dome City. See below for more information.

Auction House: The Auction House has undergone major improvements to make it easier for players to buy and sell. See below for more.

Arena Matches: The Arena matches now occur on a timer (similar to Raids). After the timer goes off, there is a 10-minute "signup" period in which players can join the queue (in pre-made teams of up to 10 players). After the sign-up period, teams will be matched against one another based on skill level. [REWARDS? OTHER DETAILS ON HOW THIS WORKS?]

Double Agent Matches: Double Agent matches now occur on a timer (similar to Raids). After the timer goes off, there is a 10-minute "signup" period in which players can join the queue (in pre-made teams of up to 10 players). After the sign-up period, teams will be matched against one another based on skill level.[REWARDS? OTHER DETAILS ON HOW THIS WORKS?]

Mission Queuing: A variety of changes have occurred to Mission Queuing to make it easier to get matches across all server regions (North Amer, Europe, etc) and to improve backfilling. More details below.

Tokens: You can now earn a maximum of 50,000 tokens in a week. Likewise, you may hold a maximum of 50,000 tokens in your bank. The daily limit on tokens has been removed (in favor of the weekly cap).

Boosts: Purchased player boosts now double credits and double end-of-mission loot in addition to XP and Tokens. Players should now inspect the STATS screen on Agent Profile to see key information on their active boost. Several bug fixes have also been made to the boost calculation.

New PvE Consumables - Four new craftable PvE consumables have been added. More details below.

AvA Rewards

Modifications and Repair Kits -- You may know add a modification to a particular weapon or armor piece using the "wrench" underneath the weapon or armor on the Agent Profile screen (verus having to use the Modification Implant kiosk in Dome City). When you press the wrench, you will be prompted whether to Repair the Item (using a repair kit), or Mod the Item (using a Mod).

Timer in Special Ops PvE Missions -- If you initially enter the Boss Room with less than 4 minutes remaining in a Special Ops mission, the timer will be reset to 4 minutes (giving you additional time for the boss fight).

Inspect -- Inspect now occurs using the "X" key by default (instead of left-mouse click). This can be changed using the CONTROLS menu. You may now inspect players inside the Open Zone.

STOCK MARKET MODEL: Most items sold on the Auction House will now use a "stock market" buy/sell model. Under this model, the seller provides a price for the item that is being sold (the "ask" price). Buyers then see all items of that type and at that same price grouped into a single line on the auction house screen. Buyers see the lowest 5 selling prices for any given item. Buyers can purchase one or more of the same item from different sellers by simply providing a price (the "bid" price) at which they are willing to purchase. The auction house will automatically reconcile the transaction with all the different sellers (on a first-in-first-out basis) who sold their merchandise when any single buyer completes a purchase. Some specialized and unique items will continue to be sold using the standard auction model of incremental bids over time. The auction house makes the decision about which model to use (stock market or standard auction) based on the item type.

NEW SIMPLIFIED SELLING SCREEN: The Auction House UI has undergone significant changes. When you select an item for sale, the panel automatically populates the quantity for sale with the total you have in inventory (of course you can change that) and with the current market price for this item (the lowest ask price, also something you can change).

ITEM CATEGORIES: There are now just a hand full of item categories on the left side of the auction screen and no confusing sub-types.

PREVIEW: You may now preview Auction House items on your character prior to buying.

OTHER FIXES: Various defects addressed related to expanding and collapsing menus.

Mission Queueing

SERVER REGIONS: There is no longer a drop-down to select your server region on the Mission screen. Instead, your default server region (North America, Europe, etc.) is chosen automatically when you login, based on your IP address. You can modify your default server region on the SETTINGS menu. When you queue for a mission, you will be paired in matches with others from your default server region, unless no match can be made within a reasonable waiting period, at which point, you may be matched onto another server region. If you do not wish to ever be matched into a match on another server region, you may uncheck the flag to "Match on other Regions".

BACKFILLING: If the "Volunteer me for late backfills" checkbox is checked on your SETTINGS menu ("on" by default), you will be aggressively backfilled into existing matches if a team is short players. Players that are backfilled into matches will receive the full reward for the match, as if they were in the match from the beginning.

TIME TO NEXT TIMER-DRIVEN MISSION: For those missions queues that are only available at timed intervals (such as Raids), the Mission screen now displays the time until the next mission availability.

MISSION ACCEPT DIALOG: You no have 30 seconds to accept a Mission (used to be 60 seconds). The Mission Accept dialogue will show a countdown of how many seconds you have remaining to accept the mission.

Special Vanity ItemsThere are two new special, craftable "Vanity" items in the 1.37 release. Magic Elf Goggles, which you wear during PvP matches and cause all enemies to appear to have elf heads (so you can have fun shooting them); and a Vanity Pet (Sparky), which follows you in Dome City while also giving your character a 50% groundspeed boost while in Dome City. To craft these items, you must possess a special blueprint. Only a very limited number of blueprints for these items will be placed on the Auction House for bidding. One you win this blueprint, you can craft unlimited items with it. One or more of the components for the special items must be purchased from Carter's Accessory store, using tokens. This is to limit the number that can be crafted per day, as well as increase the value and rarity of the items.

Craftable PvE Consumables

There are four new craftable PvE Consumables in Version 1.37:

Lasting Damage (Rare) - Provides 10% damage boost for either 15 minutes or until you die or leave the mission instance. Stacks with all damage buffs.

Lasting Energy (Rare) - Provides 30% power recharge for either 15 minutes or until you die or leave the mission instance.

Lasting Regeneration (Rare) - Slow regeneration for 15 minutes or until you die or leave the mission instance. Stacks with all Healing.

Repo Android (Epic) - Deploys a powerful Repurposed Android.

Each consumable is craftable, and the items should be available for crafting them either through salvage or a new vendor in dome city. Note that the item for crafting the Repo Android comes only from salvaging Epic items. This is a new component item. You must level your crafting along the Consumable path to craft Rare and Epic items.